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CHAP. 56.—THE ROOTS OF TREES.

There are great differences, too, in the roots of trees. In the
fig, the robur, and the plane, they are numerous; in the apple
they are short and thin, while in the fir and the larch they
are single; and by this single root is the tree supported, although we find some small fibres thrown out from it laterally
They are thick and unequal in the laurel and the olive, in
which last they are branchy also; while in the robur they
are solid and fleshy.1 The robur, too, throws its roots downwards to a very considerable depth. Indeed, if we are to believe Virgil,2 the æsculus has a root that descends as deep
into the earth as the height to which the trunk ascends in the
air. The roots of the olive, the apple, and the cypress, creep
almost upon the very surface: in some trees they run straight
and horizontally, as in the laurel and the olive; while in others
they have a sinuous course—the fig for example. In some
trees the roots are bristling with small filaments, as in the
fir, and many of the forest trees; the mountaineers cut off
these fine filaments, and weave with them very handsome
flasks,3 and various other articles.

Some writers say that the roots of trees do not descend
below the level to which the sun's heat is able to penetrate;
which, of course, depends upon the nature of the soil, whether
it happens to be thin or dense. This, however, I look upon4
as a mistake: and, in fact, we find it stated by some authors
that a fir was transplanted, the roots of which had penetrated
eight cubits in depth, and even then the whole of it was nut
dug up, it being torn asunder.5 The citrus has a root that
goes the very deepest of all, and is of great extent; next after
it come the plane, the robur, and the various glandiferous
trees. In some trees, the laurel for instance, the roots are
more tenacious of life the nearer they are to the surface:
hence, when the trunk withers, it is cut down, and the tree
shoots again with redoubled vigour. Some think that the
shorter the roots are, the more rapidly the tree decays; a supposition which is plainly contradicted by the fig, the root of
which is among the very largest, while the tree becomes aged
at a remarkably early period. I regard also as incorrect what
some authors have stated, as to the roots of trees diminishing6
when they are old; for I once saw an ancient oak, uprooted
by a storm, the roots of which covered a jugerum of ground.

1 The roots of trees being ligneous, " carnosæ," Fée remarks, is an inappropriate term.

5 See B. xii. c. 5, and B. xiii. c. 29. What Pliny states of the fir, or
Abies pectinata, Theophrastus relates of the πεύκη,, or Abies excelsa of
Decandolles. There is little doubt that in either case the statement is incorrect.

6 On the contrary, the roots of trees increase in size till the period of
their death.

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